Labour wins on historically low share

Britain’s Labour Party won the UK general election held on Thursday, and with it marked two records: the first time that the traditionally left wing party has won a third term, and the first time that a party has won with such a low share of the vote, with just 36%.

The UK’s first past the post electoral system effectively rules out coalitions.

Prime Minister Tony Blair said that the results showed there were “lessons to learn”.

With late counting still going on at 09.00 Cyprus time on Friday morning, Labour had confirmed 351 seats, the Conservatives 192 seats and the Liberal Democrats 59 seats.

Conservative leader Michael Howard had already conceded defeat in the small hours of Friday morning.

The Labour majority looks like it will be cut from 167 to about 67 seats, the Conservatives have gained around a net 29 seats, while the Liberal Democrats, now calling themselves a real force in British politics, gained around a net 12 seats. It was the best result since 1923.

The FTSE 100 rallied yesterday as the exit polls showed that the results would be more or less as expected. The FTSE closed Thursday up 19.8 points at 4902.3.